Ensalada: Classic Filipino Side Dish

 There are many interesting things about the Philippine cuisine. Various cultural influences are stewed in the food- Spanish, Chinese, America, Mexican, Southeast-Asian. Much to say.

 Like toyo, patis, and calamansi, which are typical accompaniments to almost every meal, ensaladas are refreshing accompaniments to many main dishes as well. Ensaladas (similar term for Spanish and Mexican cuisine for salad) are usually composed of fruit, vegetable, seaweed, and an acidulant like vinegar or calamansi.  They match fried and grilled foods perfectly, contrasting the savory and sometimes fatty textures of meat.

Among my favorites are grilled eggplant, mango, tomato for main ingredients, with chopped onions and chilies on the side. Just plain good.

Back to the Kitchen

After almost two years of being away from the kitchen (since 2009 when I resigned from my last post as EC), it seems that I am thrilled to be back again. I withdrew from the kitchen temporarily, trying to see if it would elude me, but then some passions just don't die. It was fun to go back and start all over again. 

I just signed contract with the culinary school again where they gave me more advanced subjects to teach. Pretty challenging, specially if I had been used to doing all the easier ones.

Hand-rolled pasta. In beef and tomato sauce.

Refuge of the Complex

 Lately I couldn't stop the many chatters inside my head. I had been very busy moving around too much, turning like a hurricane, always trying to outrun something. What was it that I was running after? And when tired, all I wanted to do was lean back and see things in a different way. 

I am moved deeply by individuals who take some pleasure in being simple. In being humble in their ways and unmoved by whatever happens in the world. Though I do not consider that trait at all as being passive, there is  a screaming wisdom in just being calm and at peace with the world. With nothing to anxious about. With being satisfied. With seeing big things in what is little. 

Despite the distance of my house from grandma's, I made a point to visit my daughter who is on vacation there. In Julienne's company, all big dreams in the world seem to fall away, and all that matters is the little world that exists in those little hoop of her arms. There's a whole world around young children. They see the smallest piece of cookie crumb on the bed and try to pick it up with their small fingers. They see the small, the simple.

Now I am trying to appreciate the lace-like patterns on the wings of a dragonfly.